Teacher Discussion Forums

Hello everyone

I am quite new here but I tried searching for answers for my dilemma first but without any major luck, so here I go

I am an ESL teacher in China (Changsha, Hunan), actually saying teacher would be lying because I am still only an intern taking my TEFL certificate. I started teaching in September with no prior experience other than 120 hours training in Beijing. My classes are doing great and my supervisor is really pleased with me, but I know there is one thing that I need to improve on, and that is activities within the lesson to make the kids that little bit more interested and active.

I am teaching at a privatly owned boarding school in Changsha and the education group that owns the school also owns three other schools where I teach. I am teaching Primary school Grade 1, 2, 4, 5, 6 and my class size vary from the smallest one being 37 and the biggest class being 73 students.

I know that this site has a lot of activites, but I fear that most of them are mostly suited for smaller classes, at least many of the games will be of no use in a class of 73 without having more than half of the class spending most of the time waiting for their turn.

Hangman and instant quizzes can only be used so many times with the same kids before they find the whole concept rather boring. If there are anyone out there, teaching huge classes like I am, I would like to hear from you!

I would like to move on and actually get a teaching job when I am done with my internship this coming january and my activites in the classroom is my biggest weakness apart from my obvious lack of experience

Thanks in advance!

Welcome to the profession. I wish you many years in this rewarding field.

There is something called a "Sticky" on this forum. It appears at the top of list of posts in this forum and there is one for large classes. It has many great ideas.

Hi Sally

I saw and have been through the sticky at the top, however it seemed it was mostly clasroom management stuff that was in there but I might remember wrong. Could be I just didn't find exactly something that I was looking for, but I will go through it again in either case

There is also a Sticky for games. If you treat the large class like 7 small classes of 10, then you can play any game that is suitable for smaller classes. Appoint one student as head and give them the materials for their group. Demonstrate with one group at the front of the class and then let the other groups play while you circulate and help out when they get stuck.

I used Bingo a lot at the beginning of each theme - transportation, weather, the hospital, etc. It was a great way to review the vocabulary. I made cards with the vocabulary scrambled and had the children print out the words underneath when the item was chosen. I played until everyone won. The others could turn around and help their closest seat mates when they had completed their cards. I had large flash cards to chose from and put them in a row along the board with a string and clothespins at first and them made a pocket chart with plastic and fabric. The person who got the same vocabulary in the same order as the pocket chart Bingo card won a prize. It only happened three or four times in a year but seemed to be an extra incentive. I taught them expessions for winning and losing, "Oh,, no I didn't get that one. I don't have that one. I have that one. I have a full row." so it was a noisy class in addition to having most of the 80 or so repeating the word as I called it. I laminated the cards with packing tape so I could use them over and over and left them for future teachers.

We put the flashi cards in alphabetical order, played match with two sets, played memory, played Go Fish.

They drew pictures using the vocabulary and labeled their drawings. We made books of the drawings and passed them around the classes. Later we used the drawings to make a story, wild though they sometimes were and printed the stories on the bottom and passed those around. You can cut out cartoon characters and put them on the drawings to make up some sort of story from the background.

Each group made a poster or made a curtain for the windows with fabric markers with the vocabulary, with illustrations. We put the posters on the roof eventually and laminated the best ones to save. They were great for review.

We had shouting matches with the teams having 10 words and the person from each team with the word I pulled had to stand up and shout the word. Points for the first to shout but it meant they heard the word 10 times. (I always had lots of complaints from other teachers that my classes were too noisy of course, Then I would have them whisper for awhile.)

Lots of singing. They would bring in their favourite songs and we would make posters of the words and sing along, dance along, perform a play.

Brings back good memories. Right now I am using Pokemon cards - there are over 500 names which covers most of the sounds of English.

Hi there,
Here's a large class game for you that is adaptable to any language, and is excellent for drilling specific grammar or vocab. It can be done with flashcards as an aid, or with nothing at all.

It allows the whole class to get in some speaking practice in a short time.

http://www.teachingenglishgames.com

Relay Race

1. How to Play

2. Language ideas to use with this game

3. Reading and spelling variant

This game is to be played once your students are familiar
with the vocabulary and sentences that you wish to
practise. This is a speaking practice game, or a revision
game.

It is ideal for drilling in new vocabulary or grammar, in a
fun way of course!


1. HOW TO PLAY

Divide your class into teams. If you have space then line
the teams up in your space. If you have rows of desks then
make each row a team and have the children stand up in
between their desks. If you have children on benches with
no room to move, then make each horizontal row a team.

Give the first child in each row a flashcard with a picture
on it. When you say "go", the first child turns to the
next one, names the item on the card and passes it along
the line. Each child must take the item and pass it to the
next child in the row while naming the item.

The winning team is the one which gets the picture card
down the end of the line first. You can of course play so
that the card has to come back to the front again.

It is a good idea to use referees. A referee is someone
nominated from another team who listens in as the card is
passed down the line and makes sure that the word is said
properly, and that accuracy is not sacrificed for speed.

If you would like this game to be quiet then play as above
but make a rule that only whispering is allowed.

If necessary you can make a rule that anyone not playing
properly or messing around, or being loud, will mean that
the card in that team has to start back at the beginning
again, or is confiscated meaning that the team cannot win a
point in that round.

The use of picture cards is good because it adds a fun
element to the game. The children can see the progress of
the card travelling down their own line, and the lines of
other teams, so it adds some excitement.

In addition it allows you to see who should and who
shouldn't be talking.

You can have a useful rule where only the players holding
the card can talk - it is a "pass" to be able to speak. In
that sense you don't even have to pass down a relevant
picture, but can use anything - such as a book.


2. Language ideas to use with this game

So now I'd like to explore how else we can exploit this
basic idea, and what other language we can use in this game.

You can use it as shown above to drill in and reinforce
vocabulary.

However it is also very useful for practising a specific
target structure, such as a tense, or question form.

In fact you can have any language passed down the line,
which makes this an extremely useful game to have up your
sleeve.

If you wanted to make the game a little more challenging
then you could use the game to practise questions and
answers. The first player asks the required question,
hands the card over, and the second player answers the
question, and then hands the card to the third player, who
asks the fourth player the question.



3. Reading and spelling

If you use word flashcards instead of pictures the children
will see the spelling of the words frequently. However it
is better to use pictures for memorising.

A spelling variant on this game is to give the first child
a sheet of paper with several words on it. This child is
not allowed to show the paper to the second player but must
spell out the first word. The second player has to work
out what the word is and say it out loud.

If the second player is correct the first player hands the
paper over and the second child spells the second word to
the third player, who names it, takes the paper and so on.

This is quite challenging so you could play with
intermediate players and even teenagers and adults will
find this fun.


Enjoy the game
Shelley

Happened on this thread.
I conducted a poll on China Job-Related a few weeks back on class size.
From the responses it seemed that not many over 45 student classes around although I can recall my first year (2004) having about 60 in my biggest class.
That 45-ish size doesn't seem to tally with the OP's experience.
So would anyone like to chime in with their big (over 50) class size experience.
Not looking for 'how to' - I've got that, but just how prevalent large classes are? and are they the preserve of middle schools who maybe cannot afford a gaggle of FTS?
Were you told about the large class size would also be a good thing to comment on.